you look just like you fell to earth to sleep
by particularly good finder
Summary: She looks like an angel, in the most beautiful, clichéd way possible, Kurt thinks.


**Note: This is a sequel to **_**when you're worn out and tired, I'll cover you**_**, but all you need to know is that Quinn is living with the Hummels (after Babygate). The song is Waterlily, by Karine Polwart. **

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_**you look just like you fell to earth to sleep  
**_you're waiting for your waking hour.

:-:

_caught between the air and the windless deep __  
__you float like a lily flower.__  
_

It's late as Kurt slips down the stairs to his room. As much as he likes Carole and Finn Hudson, he feels immensely guilty for leaving Quinn on her own as he and his father had "bonding time" with the "family". Though Carole and Burt have only been dating for a little while, they are obviously in love; what this has in store for Quinn, Kurt isn't sure. But God knows he's worried about it every night for the past couple of weeks.

It's around midnight as he slips into his pajamas and slides into his silk-sheeted bed. Moonlight seeps through the window near the ceiling of his basement bedroom, and Kurt can't help but notice Quinn sprawled out across her cot, her pale, porcelain limbs tangled in the white sheets, spider-leg fingers gently resting on the pillow by her head. Her rose-red lips are parted as she breaths slowly and steadily, and the golden tresses that Kurt used to hate her for are spread out behind her like wings. She looks like an angel, in the most beautiful, clichéd way possible, Kurt thinks.

Underneath her nightdress (white, _of course_), a baby bump is visible, and somehow it completes the image. Kurt remembers hearing somewhere that pregnant women had a certain _glow_ about them, and if he had been skeptical before, he fully believes it now. Quinn radiates light from every pore of her body, glowing in the starlight like a waterlily shimmered in a pond; a golden center, filled with life and wonder, surrounded by a pure, white, petal-soft shell.

_all hands have forsaken you tonight._

Kurt lies back against his pillow, turning his head to further examine his friend. Lost in the sea of sheets, she looks so _tiny_. The girl who used to own McKinley High, used to strut down the halls, Finn in tow, who used to seem so _big_, was nothing but petals and glass.

When he looks at Quinn, Kurt just can't help but hate the people who call themselves her parents. Why would anyone throw away something so _precious_, so _beautiful_? It is unthinkable.

And Finn – sure, Quinn lied and cheated. But to let something like Quinn Fabray slip through your fingers so easily! Kurt scoffs at the thought, scoffs at Finn's naivety, at his sixteen-year-old emotions. Maybe Kurt is biased, but letting go of an angel's hand seems to him a near-sin.

_no cradle in the rushes, you are broken like the day,__  
__with darkness all around you like a shroud._

The porcelain of Quinn's face is cracked a bit – half-dried tearstains are visible on her cheeks, and Kurt has to stop himself from wiping them away.

The thin boy plays with the edge of his blanket absentmindedly, watching as the angel's face contorts slowly in her sleep from peace to anguish. She stirs a bit, spider-leg fingers curling and uncurling rapidly, rose-red lips twitching with unsaid words.

"Mama…" She manages to whisper, and the pain in her words is unbearable for Kurt. He moves across the room, bare feet padding quietly on the cold floor, and places a hand on her cheek as the tears start to flow again.

"Mama!" Quinn's eyes spring open, and she clings to the boy's shirt. Kurt strokes her pretty, pretty hair, whispering pretty, pretty words in her ear, telling her that it was a dream, she's alright, she's alright.

_did you curse the silent stars above?_

The world seems too quiet to Kurt. Quinn's sorrow is the only noise he can hear, her silent sobs _screaming_ at him, tearing at his eardrums until his vision goes white and his mind is shaky with pain, _her_ pain.

And even though he's in the middle of comforting the girl, trying to stop the tears running down her pretty, lily-petal cheeks, he can't help but gaze at the shimmer in her golden eyes, and suddenly they're stars. Two glorious, sad stars in the darkness of his room, outshining and out-screaming the phony, lackluster stars that dance across the sky. They know nothing of pain, of loneliness; how can they compare?

_those cruel arms abandoned you for water to embrace you,__  
__won't you lay your head my waterlily love_

Quinn's body curls so easily into Kurt's, and for a moment Kurt wishes he could be more than a friend for the girl: a father for her baby, a keeper for her heart. But he knows he can never be that person, that he can never love her in _that way_.

But at the moment, all she needs is someone to hold her, someone to show her any sort of love. And Kurt can live with that. He _can_ be that person.

They fall back on the bed together, and the angel's sobs slowly subside. Slow, deep, heavenly breaths replace the hitched gasps and watery chokes that Kurt has grown so accustomed to, and he soon finds himself drifting off as well.

Fingers gently stroking Quinn's pretty, pretty golden hair, Kurt closes his eyes and lets himself fall into a deep, deep sleep in the angel's arms.

**Short, I know. But please, please review! **


End file.
